I knew I was a relational and sexual mess after surviving my teens. Sexual addiction, abnormal fanticys, hyper vigilance, fear that somehow if I got close to anyone, they would find out about the real me I would be compleatly rejected in the same way I was rejecting myself. I lived a duble life and am only now trying to merge the two. Problem is the two lives do not go well togeather. Can they, shure but not with out conflict and pain.

About six weeks ago I started posting on MS. It has been a huge help to be able to put word to my feelings and thoughts and get real help, direction and understanding. It has helped me grow up in some ways, and is helping me to see areas where I need to grow.I have come to rely on this forum as a valued point of connection.

My sexual addiction and csa pain have caused more then just a little pain for my wife.

Where this forum has helped me to be more in touch with my iner thoughts and feelings and to be able to express them better, it seams like we are going backwards in our marriage in some ways.

My wife is afraid that I will cross some line on this forum. Or I will lose perspective. I can understand her fear. And have attempted to help her to understand what it is doing for me even to the point of explaining that I have found it to be a needed health out let so things don't build up inside of me, isolated and alone. I think she understands in the best way she can. I think she wants me to be able to process with her instead. But she is part of only one of my worlds. And she feels it. I can tell her about the other world the CSA-SA-SSA world and I do but it takes a real toll on her.

Eventually when two people get close enught through time and pressure, and all the minor stuff falls away you usually come up against fairly rigid pain, belief and fear. The stuff we are realy behaving out of.

Dating my wife years ago, she became pregnant. We got married.

I had decided not to get married and have a family, several years before we met, because of my mesed up iner world.

I love my family, my wife and my kids, more then anything, but much of my life had been devoted to protecting them from my pain and the pain it could cause them, instead of loving them. My love for them and my pain are in conflict. I knew this before I ever met my wife. I could not have a normal life. (devoted husband and farther). I am devoted to them and am amased how much affirmation, support and love I receive from my wife and children. But I am more of a control mechiniziams then a person.

Today my wife shared how much I have hurt her over the years. Direct pain I have brought in to her life. OK I know and I hate that. But never wanted this. I know that sound petty and small. But for me it's l think my worse fear coming true. My pain is harming my wife and kids.

This is a straw on my back that I can not bear. It is the stake in my hart that feals so bad that I am the pain.

The bottom line is I didn't get the chance to just go off by my self and be alone.

And I am realy thankful for that. But I can't escape the pain and it is eclipsing and infecting everything.

I said to her that If I knew then what I know now I would not have married. (FYI don't ever say this to your wife) I slipped in the "let's be realy honest" of the moment.It's going to be a thought month.

Truth is I realy feel that this is what I have and do think deep down.

None of this is simple true, false, right, wrong.

I just feel like crap right now, so I vent.

Beats self medicating.

She is meeting with a good counselor today and we will go to meat soon togeather to give her a needed support in our curent transision. Namely, me taking the lid off and working on my stuff.

The common denominator in all of my conflicts both inside and out seam to be childhood sexual abuse. Maybe it's time I just accept the mantel of victim.

My wife just came home from her counseling and saw that I was still on the computer wrighting.I had just finished and posted this. I told her I needed to process our brake down. She said she was fine and that we haven't had a brake bown. I started to cry. She hugged me and I just started to sob. Crap right? Well I really needed that. She continues to amaze me with her capasity to give me acceptance, support, and grace.

The counselor she met with said that I was doing all the right stuff and was able to give her some needed perspective. Thank God! That's all I can say.

so much of this sounds like me and my wife - IN THE PAST! now we are doing much better. so there is hope that you can get past this to a better relationship - not an easy or fun process - but do-able - and so worth it. i'll write more later, but wanted to give a quick note of encouragement.

Lee

_________________________
"That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. . . What will your verse be?" Robin Williams as John Keating in "Dead Poets Society"

SmartShadow – I’m glad you are here and I’m happy that you are participating and reaching out and asking for help. You ARE smart – because you are asking the right questions – and have the perceptiveness to know where to look for answers.

My earlier circumstances were a little different from yours. I knew there was something different about me when I was a teen and young adult – but didn’t know what was “wrong” or why. I had either “forgotten” the abuse events and their effects upon me or minimized/rationalized/denied their significance. There was a major disconnect in my life that I was not aware of. I did have hyper-vigilance, fear of relationships, fear of intimacy, fear of vulnerability, fear of touch, fear of sex, fear of feeling or expressing emotions. But I wanted all of the above and couldn’t make sense of the approach/avoidance conflict. In a sense, I led a double life – one external and one internal – very little acting out in the usual ways of substance abuse and sexual acts – because I was so out of touch and tied up in knots. i was good at pretending everything was fine while bleeding on the inside and refusing to admit it.

It was amazing that I even found anyone who would give me a chance in a relationship – we sort of stumbled into it almost by accident – both realized almost simultaneously that there was more than a friendship stating to develop and decided to take the chance and see where it would go. I had seen enough movies and read enough books and observed others enough to know what was supposed to happen and to do the “right” things. We got married and had 2 kids before the bottom dropped out. All that time, any success in the relationship was due more to her ability to keep in touch emotionally than to anything I contributed. I was there – that was about the best that could be said. Emotionally illiterate and distant and uninvolved, self-protective and impenetrable and invulnerable. She did nearly all the work of the relationship and I followed blindly along as best I could. I don’t know how she put up with me.

When too many adverse circumstances piled up and the stresses became too much for me to handle – I crashed into deep, dark, zombie-like, suicidal depression. I was guided into therapy for about a year, which saved my life and got me back to a functional level and improved our relationship. But I had only started dealing with the various levels of abuse and hadn’t even recovered the awareness of some of them.

Life went on for a couple decades. Things were better. I thought I was doing OK – or as well as could be expected – but deep down I knew that there was still something wrong. I started acting out with online g-y p0rn. There was another crash ahead. That took place about a year and a half ago. This time, the stresses weakened the dam and the flood swept me away. This time the memories came thick and fast – and brought with them a new reaction – hypers#xuality – long repressed and now on the rampage. Still only acted out in imagination and solitude. Couldn’t stand being touched or any kind of intimacy – totally isolated emotionally from her. She was hurt and devastated when she discovered my habit – felt betrayed and rejected and deceived.

At her insistence, I entered therapy again. I re-discovered MS about the same time and started substituting time spent on these forums for the p0rn. She was skeptical and jealous of my time on MS – thought it was unhealthy and counter-productive and reinforcing my problems rather than helping solve them. My T helped her accept – if not believe that this was a good thing. Now she totally supports my MS involvement – and actively encourages me to “talk” to my “friends.”

You said - “Where this forum has helped me to be more in touch with my iner thoughts and feelings and to be able to express them better, it seams like we are going backwards in our marriage in some ways.” - - - yes, I know that stage of things. It seems to get worse before it gets better. It is incredibly difficult and agonizingly painful. In a way it is doubly difficult and painful because there is another person involved who is also hurting and adding another level of complications and distractions – rather than just dealing with your own stuff. I can remember feeling anger and resentment and frustration that I had to cope with her feelings and fears as well as my own. And feeling guilt that I had inflicted so much suffering and conflict upon her. But it is a necessary process to go through. You have to drag all the ugly stuff out into the light before you can identify the bad, broken, rotten things and dispose of them. It just gets worse if they stay hidden – even though you can convince yourself and try to believe and behave like there is nothing wrong. Keep working at it. It does get better and easier and you’ll be glad you stuck it out.

This part is so true too: “I think she wants me to be able to process with her instead. But she is part of only one of my worlds. And she feels it. I can tell her about the other world the CSA-SA-SSA world and I do but it takes a real toll on her.” - - - that was also something we had to deal with – she wanted to be the one to fix everything – but I didn’t trust her enough to even reveal most of my past for fear of judgment, rejection and abandonment. And she was too naïve and unaware to handle much of it – much less qualified to do any good in helping me cope. So she felt neglected and ignored and left out of my “secrets” until I was eventually able to tentatively and experimentally start divulging the general outline of events – and later, gradually, fill in more details as I started to feel more safe and secure and overcome the fear of her negative reactions. It has been a long, hard, sensitive process that seemed endless at times – but looking back, I guess our progress was remarkably fast.

Another thing you said that I could identify with: “I said to her that If I knew then what I know now I would not have married.” - - - I have felt that way at times, too. not that I didn’t love her as much as I was able – but that I would not have wanted to impose this excruciating experience on anyone else. I don’t think I have put it quite the way you did – fortunately. But we have both said at different times that it wasn’t fair that we got into marriage being so unaware and unprepared for all the dark secrets that we’d have to deal with. At times she has blamed me for holding things back – but now I think she has accepted that I was not able to even access or recognize much of what had happened. We have forgiven one another and are still committed to one another and have promised anew to stay together and see it through.

I have been seeing the T weekly for about 15 months and for the past few months we have both been seeing the same T together. This has worked really well for us.

Bottom line – life is good now. We are loving and liking each other again. I can trust and be vulnerable emotionally as well as physically for the first time in my life – and we have true intimacy – not just s#xual intercourse. Four factors have contributed to this progress:

1. The help of a qualified, experienced professional therapist2. The resources of MS – especially the interaction with other survivors3. The support and encouragement and commitment of my faithful (and loving) wife4. The desperate, nearly hopeless, but determined faith in God that I refused to surrender

hoping that some of this might help,Lee

Edited by traveler (01/10/1310:28 PM)

_________________________
"That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. . . What will your verse be?" Robin Williams as John Keating in "Dead Poets Society"

SmartShadow, thanks for sharing. We have much in common except my wife doesn't know any of the details of my past (other than "parental neglect", which is true) and none of my addiction issues.

After nearly four years of recovery work, I can say that I am better. And my wife is better too. But there were some really painful and difficult times. I wish i could have told her the truth of my past and struggles, but it just seemed (and still seems) so unsafe.

Good for you to bring her in and let her support you!

Jim

_________________________
Loneliness is a power that we possess to give or take away forever. -Yes, Starship Trooper

It's strange but I look forward to the encouragement and the replies from you guys. It is like presents under the tree. Thank you. And yes I am so very lucky.

So we went for a drive and to talk and got back to the pain, the reason for my original post. Well we, I just went for it.

I explained more of what I have been going through. Old thought and feelings coming back to the surface. Explained that I am no longer pushing them back under ground. If they come up then I am going to stay with them even if they feel really bad. I explained that I have not been able to record many good feelings from our lives togeather because most of my focus has been dedicated to pretending that I am fine. I am not fine. All of the resurfacing feelings, memories and the realization that I am agitated and dissociating all the time tells me I am not fine. I can't pretend I am fine. My coping mechiniziams are falling away and I am dropping the act.

She said that this has been a hard day for her, yes we are having a hard day and I stoped pretending.

She continues to support and love me even more in some strange way. I supose she would rather be dealing with what is then me just putting on a highly complexed act. I am tired, I respectively resine the position.

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